glaschu.net is led by Glasgow Life working with the University of Glasgow Celtic & Gaelic department, Watercolour Music and Dr Hugh Dan MacLennan, and supported by Bòrd Na Gàidhlig. The lead designers are Dress for the Weather.

The website aims to highlight, share and explore the cultural, linguistic, historical and contemporary connections that Gaelic has with the city, and is designed to be an ongoing and developing resource.

Councillor David McDonald, Chair of Glasgow Life and Deputy Leader of Glasgow City Council, said: “Gaelic has been at the heart of the history our great city and continues to be a vital element in the dazzling mix of cultures which makes Glasgow so special. This important new online resource will help us celebrate and map the ways in which Gaelic has shaped our contemporary environment, and explore new ways in which this vibrant language can continue to be part of our daily lives and our future ambitions.”

Dr Katherine Forsyth, Director, Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) Centre for Doctoral Training in Celtic Languages, University of Glasgow, said: “Phase 1 of this project provided us with a very special opportunity to work with partners outside academia in a way that was rigorous, creative, and intensely collaborative. It has been an exciting process full of new discoveries and we have learnt greatly from the experience. We are very proud of the final result, the Glaschu website, which is full of high quality content based on cutting-edge research, presented in an accessible and visually appealing format thanks to high quality design. We look forward to continuing to work with Glasgow Life on how best to build on this terrific resource and use it to engage with diverse audiences. “

A range of associated projects and events will be taking place as part of the Merchant City Festival and Festival 2018, the dynamic cultural programme for the Glasgow 2018 European Championships, The Royal National Mod 2019 and beyond.

Glaschu is part of a three year project supported by the creation of a series of new Gaelic destinations based on Gaelic placenames and Songs across the city with new research being added to the site in January 2019. It’s an invaluable resource for school pupils, residents of, and visitors to, Glasgow and is available on personal devices.

During the research for the website, a number of new facts were uncovered, including that according to records from around 1180 Glasgow’s earliest recorded family were Gaelic speakers, and that in 1835 around 10 per cent of the population in Glasgow were Gaelic speakers.

Forthcoming associated activity includes two free to attend engagements events at Kelvin Hall on Thursday 17 and 24 May for anyone who is interest in cultural objects, stories and making things connected to Gaelic culture in Glasgow.

Information discovered during website research

Glasgow’s earliest recorded family were Gaelic-speakers: a royal document from around the year 1180 mentions the children and dependants of Gillemachoi (in modern Gaelic: GilleMoChotha, meaning ‘servant or devotee of St Mungo’). Gillemachoi and his family were bound to the land of Kinclaith, the old name for the area around Glasgow Green. They may have been contemporaries of another Gaelic-speaker, ‘the daughter of Seadna’ commemorated in the earliest form of the name ‘Shettleston’.

Church records of 1717 and 1723 note that there were ‘considerable numbers’ of Gaelic speakers in Glasgow, including some who did not speak English and required a Gaelic-speaking minister. In 1835 there were then 25,000 (about 10% of the population) Gaelic-speakers in the city, including a great many who had been born in Glasgow.”

Around 100 place-names of Gaelic origin within the city demonstrate that Gaelic was the predominant community language in the area for several centuries from around the 11th/12th century; for example: Achadh an t-Seagail (Auchenshuggle) 'rye-farm'; Blàr Lèanach (Barlinnie) 'marshy plain'; Coitcheann (Cathkin) 'common grazing'; Dail Meàrnaig (Dalmarnock) ‘St Ernéne’s water-meadow’; Gart an Abhaill (Gartnavel) 'apple-tree farm'.